Explaining globally inhomogeneous future changes in monsoons using simple moist energy diagnostics

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-45
Author(s):  
Rodrigo J. Bombardi ◽  
William R. Boos

AbstractThis study examines the annual cycle of monsoon precipitation simulated by models from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 6 (CMIP6), then uses moist energy diagnostics to explain globally inhomogeneous projected future changes. Rainy season characteristics are quantified using a consistent method across the globe. Model bias is shown to include rainy season onsets tens of days later than observed in some monsoon regions (India, Australia, and North America) and overly large summer precipitation in others (North America, South America, and southern Africa). Projected next-century changes include rainy season lengthening in the two largest Northern Hemisphere monsoon regions (South Asia and central Sahel) and shortening in the two largest Southern Hemisphere regions (South America and southern Africa). Changes in the North American and Australian monsoons are less coherent across models. To understand these changes, relative moist static energy (MSE) is defined as the difference between local and tropical-mean surface air MSE. Future changes in relative MSE in each region correlate well with onset and demise date changes. Furthermore, Southern Hemisphere regions projected to undergo rainy season shortening are spanned by an increasing equator-to-pole MSE gradient, suggesting their rainfall will be increasingly inhibited by fluxes of dry extratropical air; Northern Hemisphere regions with projected lengthening of rainy seasons undergo little change in equator-to-pole MSE gradient. Thus, although model biases raise questions on the reliability of some projections, these results suggest that globally inhomogeneous future changes in monsoon timing may be understood through simple measures of surface air MSE.

Author(s):  
John J. W. Rogers ◽  
M. Santosh

Pangea, the most recent supercontinent, attained its condition of maximum packing at ~250 Ma. At this time, it consisted of a northern part, Laurasia, and a southern part, Gondwana. Gondwana contained the southern continents—South America, Africa, India, Madagascar, Australia, and Antarctica. It had become a coherent supercontinent at ~500 Ma and accreted to Pangea largely as a single block. Laurasia consisted of the northern continents—North America, Greenland, Europe, and northern Asia. It accreted during the Late Paleozoic and became a supercontinent when fusion of these continental blocks with Gondwana occurred near the end of the Paleozoic. The configuration of Pangea, including Gondwana, can be determined accurately by tracing the patterns of magnetic stripes in the oceans that opened within it (chapters 1 and 9). The history of accretion of Laurasia is also well known, but the development of Gondwana is highly controversial. Gondwana was clearly a single supercontinent by ~500 Ma, but whether it formed by fusion of a few large blocks or the assembly of numerous small blocks is uncertain. Figure 8.1 shows Gondwana divided into East and West parts, but the boundary between them is highly controversial (see below). We start this chapter by investigating the history of Gondwana, using appendix SI to describe detailed histories of orogenic belts of Pan-African age (600–500-Ma). Then we continue with the development of Pangea, including the Paleozoic orogenic belts that led to its development. The next section summarizes the paleomagnetically determined movement of blocks from the accretion of Gondwana until the assembly of Pangea, and the last section discusses the differences between Gondwana and Laurasia in Pangea. The patterns of dispersal and development of modern oceans are left to chapter 9, and the histories of continents following dispersal to chapter 10. By the later part of the 1800s, geologists working in the southern hemisphere realized that the Paleozoic fossils that occurred there were very different from those in the northern hemisphere. They found similar fossils in South America, Africa, Madagascar, India, and Australia, and in 1913 they added Antarctica when identical specimens were found by the Scott expedition.


1847 ◽  
Vol 137 ◽  
pp. 51-57

It has long been known that in Europe the north end of a magnet suspended horizontally (meaning by the north end the end which is directed towards the north), moves to the East from the night until between 7 and 8 o’clock in the morning, when an opposite movement commences, and the north end of the magnet moves to the West . Recent observations have shown that a similar movement takes place at the same hours of local time in North America, and that it is general in the middle latitudes of the northern hemisphere. It has also been known for some years past, and has been confirmed by recent observations, that in the middle latitudes of the southern hemisphere, the north end of the magnet moves in a contrary direction to that which has been described as taking place in the northern hemisphere, viz. that it moves to the west until 8 o’clock in the morning, or thereabouts, and then returns towards the east.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan D. Beverley ◽  
Steven J. Woolnough ◽  
Laura H. Baker ◽  
Stephanie J. Johnson ◽  
Antje Weisheimer ◽  
...  

AbstractThe circumglobal teleconnection (CGT) is an important mode of circulation variability, with an influence across many parts of the northern hemisphere. Here, we examine the excitation mechanisms of the CGT in the ECMWF seasonal forecast model, and the relationship between the Indian summer monsoon (ISM), the CGT and the extratropical northern hemisphere circulation. Results from relaxation experiments, in which the model is corrected to reanalysis in specific regions, suggest that errors over northwest Europe are more important in inhibiting the model skill at representing the CGT, in addition to northern hemisphere skill more widely, than west-central Asia and the ISM region, although the link between ISM precipitation and the extratropical circulation is weak in all experiments. Thermal forcing experiments in the ECMWF model, in which a heating is applied over India, suggest that the ISM does force an extratropical Rossby wave train, with upper tropospheric anticyclonic anomalies over east Asia, the North Pacific and North America associated with increased ISM heating. However, this eastward-propagating branch of the wave train does not project into Europe, and the response there occurs largely through westward-propagating Rossby waves. Results from barotropic model experiments show a response that is highly consistent with the seasonal forecast model, with similar eastward- and westward-propagating Rossby waves. This westward-propagating response is shown to be important in the downstream reinforcement of the wave train between Asia and North America.


2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (10) ◽  
pp. 49-74
Author(s):  
John Smith ◽  

The globalization of production and its spread to low-income countries is the most notable transformation of the neoliberal era. Its driving force is the efforts by companies in Europe, North America and Japan to cut costs and raise profits, replacing relatively well-paid domestic labor for cheaper foreign labor. The gap in global wages, in great part the result of the suppression of the free movement of labor, provides a distorted view of the global differences in the rate of exploitation (simply, the difference between the value generated by the workers and what they are paid) upon which profits, prosperity and social peace in Europe, North America and Japan are ever-more reliant. Thus, neoliberal globalization should be seen as a new imperialist stage in capitalist development, where «imperialism» is defined by its economic foundation: the exploitation of labor in the South by capitalists from the North.


2002 ◽  
Vol 2 (5) ◽  
pp. 1599-1633 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Seifert ◽  
J. Ström ◽  
R. Krejci ◽  
A. Minikin ◽  
A. Petzold ◽  
...  

Abstract. In situ observations of aerosol particles contained in cirrus crystals are presented and compared to interstitial aerosol size distributions (non-activated particles in between the cirrus crystals). The observations were conducted in cirrus clouds in the Southern and Northern Hemisphere mid-latitudes during the INCA project. The first campaign in March and April 2000 was performed from Punta Arenas, Chile (54° S) in pristine air. The second campaign in September and October 2000 was performed from Prestwick, Scotland (53° N) in the vicinity of the North Atlantic flight corridor. Size distribution measurements of crystal residuals (particles remaining after evaporation of the crystals) show that small aerosol particles (Dp < 0.1µm) dominate the number density of residuals. The crystal residual size distributions were significantly different in the two campaigns. On average the residual size distributions were shifted towards larger sizes in the Southern Hemisphere. For a given integral residual number density, the calculated particle volume was on average three times larger in the Southern Hemisphere. This may be of significance to the vertical redistribution of aerosol mass by clouds in the tropopause region. In both campaigns the mean residual size increased with increasing crystal number density. The observations of ambient aerosol particles were consistent with the expected higher pollution level in the Northern Hemisphere. The fraction of residual particles only contributes to approximately a percent or less of the total number of particles, which is the sum of the residual and interstitial particles.


Author(s):  
Thomas T. Veblen

Although most of the continent of South America is characterized by tropical vegetation, south of the tropic of Capricorn there is a full range of temperate-latitude vegetation types including Mediterranean-type sclerophyll shrublands, grasslands, steppe, xeric woodlands, deciduous forests, and temperate rain forests. Southward along the west coast of South America the vast Atacama desert gives way to the Mediterranean-type shrublands and woodlands of central Chile, and then to increasingly wet forests all the way to Tierra del Fuego at 55°S. To the east of the Andes, these forests are bordered by the vast Patagonian steppe of bunch grasses and short shrubs. The focus of this chapter is on the region of temperate forests occurring along the western side of the southernmost part of South America, south of 33°S. The forests of the southern Andean region, including the coastal mountains as well as the Andes, are presently surrounded by physiognomically and taxonomically distinct vegetation types and have long been isolated from other forest regions. Although small in comparison with the extent of temperate forests of the Northern Hemisphere, this region is one of the largest areas of temperate forest in the Southern Hemisphere and is rich in endemic species. For readers familiar with temperate forests of the Northern Hemisphere, it is difficult to place the temper temperate forests of southern South America into a comparable ecological framework owing both to important differences in the histories of the biotas and to contrasts between the broad climatic patterns of the two hemispheres. There is no forest biome in the Southern Hemisphere that is comparable to the boreal forests of the high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. The boreal forests of the latter are dominated by evergreen conifers of needle-leaved trees, mostly in the Pinaceae family, and occur in an extremely continental climate. In contrast, at high latitudes in southern South America, forests are dominated mostly by broadleaved trees such as the southern beech genus (Nothofagus). Evergreen conifers with needle or scaleleaves (from families other than the Pinaceae) are a relatively minor component of these forests.


Geophysics ◽  
1961 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. C. Behrendt ◽  
G. P. Woollard

Observations with a LaCoste and Romberg geodetic gravimeter having a very low nearly linear drift rate, a high reading precision, and a world wide range were made at approximately three hundred sites in order to check and extend the gravity control network in North America. The sites occupied were mostly at former gravimeter bases located at airports, harbors, universities, and pendulum stations. The instrument was calibrated against the North American standardization range of pendulum measurements from Paso de Cortes, Mexico, to Fairbanks, Alaska, using the weighted mean values of the observations established with the U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, Cambridge University (England), and Gulf‐University of Wisconsin pendulum equipment. A statistical evaluation of the precision of the network based on the reoccupations at 40 major control stations gives an estimated standard deviation of 0.08 mgal. The airport network of bases previously reported by Woollard (1958) that was established with high range Worden gravity meters was found to require a systematic correction of 0.3 mgal per 1,000 mgal change because of the difference in calibration standard used. The adjusted values for the forty airport stations reoccupied agree on the average to 0.2 mgal with the results of this study. The reoccupations of the old pendulum observation sites of the U. S. Coast and Goedetic Survey suggest that much of this network is in error by over 3 mgals. Descriptions of sites occupied and the principal facts for position, elevation, observed gravity, and free‐air and Bouguer anomalies are presented.


1992 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 324-324
Author(s):  
Keith Young

In northeastern Chihuahua and Trans-Pecos Texas, in the early Late Albian zone of Hysteroceras varicosum occurs the Boeseites romeri (Haas) fauna with B. romeri (Hass), B. perarmata (Hass), B. aff. barbouri (Haas), B. cf. howelli (Haas), B.proteus (Haas), Prohysteroceras cf. P. hanhaense Haas, Elobiceras sp., and Dipoloceras (?) sp. B. perarmata has also been collected at Cerro Mercado, near Monclova, Coahuila. Haas originally described this fauna from Angola. Now, from rocks in the same zone in the Sierra Mojada, Coahuila, Mexico, there is a form related to if not identical with Hysteroceras famelicum Van Hoepen, also originally described from Angola and also from the zone of Hysteroceras varicosum.These fossils are known only from southern North America and Angola; they have not been described from the European Tethys. In 1984 I suggested that during the highstand of sea level of the early Late Albian (Hysteroceras varicosum zone) these ammonites migrated from Angola to Mexico and Trans-Pecos Texas via an epeiric seaway extending across the sag between South America and Africa proposed by Kennedy and Cooper. This would be twelve to fifteen million years prior to an oceanic connection between the North and South Atlantic.I would now ask, can similar epeiric seas and highstands of sea level explain the migration of successive European, Tethyan, Jurassic ammonite faunas down the Mozambique Channel and around the horn of Africa into the Neuquen Basin of Argentina before Africa and Antarctica separated, as proposed by Spath.


2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 491-520 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. J. O'Brien ◽  
J. A. Peloquin ◽  
M. Vogt ◽  
M. Heinle ◽  
N. Gruber ◽  
...  

Abstract. Coccolithophores are calcifying marine phytoplankton of the class Prymnesiophyceae. They are considered to play an import role in the global carbon cycle through the production and export of organic carbon and calcite. We have compiled observations of global coccolithophore abundance from several existing databases as well as individual contributions of published and unpublished datasets. We estimate carbon biomass using standardised conversion methods and provide estimates of uncertainty associated with these values. The database contains 58 384 individual observations at various taxonomic levels. This corresponds to 12 391 observations of total coccolithophore abundance and biomass. The data span a time period of 1929–2008, with observations from all ocean basins and all seasons, and at depths ranging from the surface to 500 m. Highest biomass values are reported in the North Atlantic, with a maximum of 501.7 μg C l−1. Lower values are reported for the Pacific (maximum of 79.4 μg C l−1) and Indian Ocean (up to 178.3 μg C l−1). Coccolithophores are reported across all latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere, from the Equator to 89° N, although biomass values fall below 3 μg C l−1 north of 70° N. In the Southern Hemisphere, biomass values fall rapidly south of 50° S, with only a single non-zero observation south of 60° S. Biomass values show a clear seasonal cycle in the Northern Hemisphere, reaching a maximum in the summer months (June–July). In the Southern Hemisphere the seasonal cycle is less evident, possibly due to a greater proportion of low-latitude data. The original and gridded datasets can be downloaded from Pangaea (http://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.785092).


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